The Unforgiven
by luxaeterna22
Summary: Post Battle of Hogwarts AU. Hermione Granger thought maybe, just maybe, she'd never be okay again. But redemption is an unexpected thing, a frenzy of snowfall, of fingers tangled in hair, the resonance of silence, silver eyes, breathless minutes of coming to let go. Hermione Granger thought maybe, just maybe, she'd forgive him.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: Hi. I'm not JK Rowling. Cover art for this story is a piece by Dimitra Milan. She is an INCREDIBLE artist.**

 **AN: It's been two years since I wrote this story, and after a lot in between, I wanted to come back to it. So some things have changed (the title, some details, descriptions, etc.) but the plotline will be the same. Mostly. Maybe. Here we go, round 2. I'll be reposting the edited chapters as I get through them.**

The Unforgiven

Chapter One

 _Time flies over us,_

 _but leaves its shadow behind._

Nathaniel Hawthorne

The snow flurried down around the courtyard like a dance with no pattern, covering the ground in an image of fragile lace. Everyone was inside on a day like this, how could they not be? Coldness seemed to turn people to a heat that could burn away the memory of it. But Hermione Granger sat on a stone bench, her face turned toward the sky as snowflakes adorned themselves upon her hair. She knew she should go inside, knew it and felt it in the tremble of her skin, but her limbs wouldn't move. Like a statue, she watched the winter storm place itself at her feet, assailing the earth with feather light kisses.

She used to despise the winter, the way it chilled her bones with its icy fingers, reaching inside her like a gloved hand to create shiver upon shiver, as if she were the sea, as if she could be so easily moved. She used to despise it. But now, all she seemed to do was sit in the cold and grate her lungs with freezing air as thoughts came crashing down on her as harshly and as quietly as the snow fell from the sky. Nothing had turned out like she thought it would.

She had come back to Hogwarts after the war, but it wasn't at all the way it was supposed to be. The thought almost made her smile, almost. As if there was a 'supposed to be'. Deftly, she felt hands curl into fists, her numb fingertips pressing into her palms too hard, but she didn't feel it. She didn't care. Harry Potter was dead. So was Voldemort, but somehow the thought didn't comfort her. She had lost her closest friend. Swallowing the lump in her throat that seemed to appear every time she thought of him she shook her head, as if she could physically dislodge that image, that image of him – no. She knew she wasn't the only one who had lost someone, that her pain wasn't special. So many people had lost someone, too many people. Their whole sixth year had been spent fighting in a grueling battle that took countless lives, carved like notches into the very skin of those who dared to survive.

In the end though, Harry, Ron and Hermione had destroyed every horcrux, evaded every trap, and it still wasn't enough. Every night it seemed she saw the same fucking thing replayed in her mind again and again. Ginny, struck down by a curse that shredded apart her lungs. What was it like to be choked by your own blood? Harry charging across a courtyard strewn with fallen stones and slain bodies. Voldemort laughing maniacally as Harry threw both of their bodies off the edge of the cliff while she stood there, useless, watching, unable to save the people she cared about most.

Her fist slammed down against the stone bench. Thinking about these things wouldn't get her anywhere. It wouldn't bring them. Nothing could. She opened her eyes, watching her breath disband in the air above her. She saw death in everything. She used to despise the winter, and now it was the only time she felt like herself. Maybe that was because the world around her finally reflected how she felt inside – cold and frozen in time. She smiled cruelly at the thought.

"Hermione." A voice from behind her made her turn.

"What are you doing out here, its freezing." Ron stood by the stone archway leading out into the courtyard, bundled in a scarf and mittens, a gray hat pulled down over his ears. A long scar ran down the side of his face and onto his neck. Hermione stood up, shaking her head and watching the snowflakes fall from her hair like glitter. Looking up again she walked over to him, silent. She didn't need to say a word, though, not anymore. He pulled her into his arms.

"I know," he whispered, "I miss him too."

Damnit, she didn't want to cry. She wanted to be strong, the way she used to be. So she clenched her jaw hard, squeezing her eyes shut. Everyone else seemed to be moving on, comforted by the living, not haunted by the dead like she was. For a moment, Ron held her tighter. He was the only family she had left now that her parents no longer knew who she was. Harry was dead. Ginny was gone. It seemed like everyone she had been close to except for Ron had slipped away into darkness and as desperately as she reached out for them, she knew her hands would never find theirs.

"I'm okay, I swear."

She pulled away from him, putting on a smile, a mask she had grown so talented at wearing these days. He smiled back at her, believing her lie so easily because he wanted it to be true. They walked together back into the castle, side by side, but to Hermione, it felt like miles between them. The younger students laughed down the hallways, moving easily through halls that they would fill with memories. Hermione couldn't help but to their faces, smiling and talking excitedly to each other. She had been just like them. Now she could barely look herself in the mirror, afraid to see the girl that would look back at her.

"Hermione, are you listening to me?" Ron nudged her shoulder and she nodded faintly.

"Huh? Yeah. Food. Sounds good." He shook his head, rolling his eyes at her. She knew he worried, that he had grown anxious from her stunted replies, and emotionless demeanor, but god, a part of her didn't even care. What was so horribly wrong with feeling loss? She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. He would never leave her side, but a part of her knew he was tired of constantly being afraid for her. He wanted so badly for her to just be okay. Why couldn't she be? She swallowed hard around the realization that maybe she didn't want to be okay. Maybe she never would be again. Would he stay with her then?

"I'm sorry, I was just a little distracted. Honestly, food sounds great. I'm starving." She tried to sound sincere, but she could hear the robotic undertone of her words. Damnit. She didn't even feel like a person anymore. But Ron's shoulders seemed to relax at her words, and he looked over at her and smiled.

"Don't worry about it. I know you're trying Hermione. That's all I need." Looking up at him, she wondered to herself if he had always been so intuitive. Then, she felt something slam into her shoulder causing her to stumble backwards, nearly falling.

"Watch it, Granger," a low, icy voice said, close to her ear. Draco Malfoy strode past her, tall and fair haired and colder than the bloody winter. Whatever, let him play his little games. But before she could turn away, her breath caught in her throat. No way. No fucking way. There it was, glimmering like the wink of the damn devil on his chest. The Head Boy badge.

With all the repairs the school had needed after the war, term had been postponed until late in the winter and Hermione hadn't even known she was appointed Head Girl until she had arrived back at Hogwarts. She had spent the first few nights bunked in the Gryffindor tower, afraid to sleep on her own after spending the summer in the safe warmth of the Weasley family's home. Head duties wouldn't begin until the following week with all the chaos surrounding repairs, so she hadn't had a chance to find out who would be sharing the honor with her, and more importantly, the Head dormitories. Well, she certainly knew now.

"Hermione, don't even give that asshole a second thought." Ron pulled her arm, hassling her to go. She let herself be dragged down the hall by him, still too shocked to speak.

"Ron," she finally managed. "Ron, Malfoy is Head Boy." At this, Ron stopped in his tracks too, wrenching her around so that she stood in front of him, his hand gripping her arm.

"Oh. Oh no!" He couldn't help the laugh that overlaid his words. "You've got to live with that git for the whole year?!" He looked her up and down, wide eyed, as if gauging whether she would survive it. Eventually he let go of her arm and placed his hands on her shoulders.

"You're done for." Rolling her eyes, she shoved his hands off of her.

"Oh, really, Ronald. I can handle Malfoy. He's a prat, but, and correct me if I'm wrong, I think I might have faced worse than his immature, slimy attempts at bullying." She looked fiercely up at Ron, who, to her surprise, was smiling wildly at her.

"What?" She said blatantly.

"Nothing," he said, scooping his arm around her shoulder and hauling her once more down the hallway.

"It's just, I haven't seen you so fired up in a long time. It's nice. I thought I'd lost you there for a second." Hermione felt a wave of shock race through her mind. Had her mask really been so transparent? She again shoved Ron off of her, smiling over at his antics.

"Shut up," she mumbled, but found herself laughing. And for the first time in a long time, it was sincere.

xxxxx

Her footsteps echoed like empty words down the long hallway as Hermione left the Gryffindor common room. After dinner, Ron had forced her along to yet another back to school party, seemingly encouraged by her brief moment of animation over the Malfoy Misfortune, as they were calling it. Admittedly, the party hadn't been as bad as she thought it would be. Maybe the reason she felt so isolated was because she had been pushing everyone away. She had wanted to be alone, she knew that, it was easier that way. But there was a spark now, buried in her chest, and she had to keep trying to be happy, if only for Ron.

Without realizing it, her footsteps had quickened and she was racing up the stairs towards the Head dormitory. She suddenly felt so light as she dashed down hallways, her hair flying behind her like a banner of curls. A smile broke across her face as she tore around corners faster and faster. She felt free, the air pushing past her face, cool and sweet and musty. Her feet hit the ground like wing beats, the soft snapping noise of freedom. She rounded the last corner already shouting "Arcturus", the password to her dormitory, when she felt herself collide hard with something and topple to the ground.

Stormy grey eyes stared up at her in surprise. It only took her a second to realize she had fallen on top of Draco Malfoy. Her eyes met his and suddenly she felt like an electric wire had been strung through her arteries. All at once she couldn't look away and wanted nothing more than to do so. She felt a heavy blush color her cheeks at the intensity of his eyes on hers. She hung suspended in the moment, suddenly aware of the heat of his body pressed beneath her. Suddenly, and completely inappropriately, she began to laugh. Hard. Her forehead fell against his chest, and she could feel his breathing hitch at her complete lack of sanity, lying on top of him, laughing like a lunatic. Gripping his shoulders she looked up into his face again, and had to bite her lip to keep herself from laughing again at the utter shock she found there.

Recovering herself, and realizing that she was sprawled upon and holding onto Draco Motherfucking Malfoys body in a way intimate enough to make her blush, she quickly scrambled off of him. What was she thinking? This was Malfoy - ruthless, cruel, former death eater Malfoy. Whatever had just happened, it was obviously a side effect of the jungle juice she had delightfully discovered at the Gryffindor party. Obviously Malfoy was coming to the same conclusion, that she was drunk and unmanageably crazy, as he had pushed himself up and sat glaring at her menacingly.

"What the fuck, Granger?" He growled at her.

His words broke apart her blank expression as she returned full force the glare he was giving her. She stood up, looking away from him and walking towards the portrait that marked the entrance to their dormitory.

"To put it in your own words, Malfoy, watch it."

"Are you kidding me? You're the one who bolted around the corner like a lunatic and pinned me to the ground laughing."

She heard his footsteps come up behind her and suddenly, with a wrench of her arm, he shoved her into the wall, holding her there with both hands on her wrists. A prickle of fear ran down her spine as she met his eyes again. They flashed with anger as he stared down at her, a murderous expression on his face. She had never seen Malfoy like this. Before the war he had been a dick, sure, but he always seemed hesitant and unthreatening somehow. But now, staring down at her, he seemed solid, unbreakable, and dangerous.

No way in hell was she about to take this from him. She felt herself smile sweetly up at him as she thrust her knee up as hard as she could, hitting him where, she was sure, it hurt. He crumpled in front of her, cursing under his breath. For a moment, she almost felt guilty, his white hair falling over his face as he doubled over. His mother had been killed by Voldemort, and his father had been sent to Azkaban. Like her, he was all alone, nowhere to go home to, no one to call family, but worse, he had no friends to speak of. But she pushed the thought away. Regardless, he was still the same malicious person who took pleasure from causing other people pain.

"Don't ever touch me again," she said in a low voice, stepping around him. She walked up to the portrait, called out the password, and strode inside, leaving him there in the hallway.

She heard the portrait swing shut behind her and she stopped in the middle of the room, breathing in the quiet. A large brown couch and two matching armchairs sat around a low wooden table in front of a large and ornately carved stone fireplace at the far end of the room. Two big windows sat on either side, allowing moonlight to pool into the space and mix with the orange haze of the fire. To her right, a round table with two chairs sat near the corner, a crystal chandelier hanging over its center. A small kitchen was inlaid in the wall next to it. Bookcases filled with volumes of every genre lined the walls. On each side of the room, and short set of stairs led up to the separate quarters of the Head Boy and Head Girl.

Hermione stood there for a moment, her mind reeling. What in the hell had Malfoy been thinking? Why had he grabbed her like that? She swallowed hard, forcing the thought of his piercing grey eyes from her mind. No use thinking about useless things. She stomped off to the room on the right, locking the door behind her and falling onto her bed, not even bothering to change her clothes before falling asleep.

xxxxx

Screaming filled the air like it was built into the very molecules, rushing into her ears, unstoppable. All around her, lights flashed and voices shouted vicious words. It was as if she had stopped being Hermione and was stuck on autopilot, diving through the crowd, flinging curses and blocking spells. She couldn't let herself look, not truly, because she knew what would meet her eyes – cold hands lying on the ground, lifeless faces turned toward the sky, blood and wounds and agony and questions why? Why? Why? Why? Please, someone tell me why they're gone. I'll do anything, just bring them back. Why? Why? Why? So she didn't look, her mind hazed through the battle, only seeing the spells as they flew out of her mouth and wand. Bang. A sound rang out like a gunshot, and suddenly time slowed down. Her head whipped around, and there was Ginny – Ginny falling to her knees. Ginny with blood pouring out of her mouth. Ginny with her hands clutched to her chest. Ginny with tears running down her face, covered in dirt and sweat and fear. Hermione felt her wand lower. She felt her feet carrying her towards the girl she had thought of as her little sister.

She stopped as her stomach contracted and her vision lurched. All she could do was watch. Harry was suddenly by the young girls side, too young. His hands were tangled in her hair. Hermione saw his mouth moving, shouting, screaming why, why, why, but she couldn't hear a thing. Her mind was replaying that moment she had overheard between the two of them. It had been earlier in the year, before they had become inseparable. Everyone in the Order was staying at the Burrow. Hermione had crept down the stairs, unable to sleep with the thoughts of impending war crowding her mind. She had stopped when she heard voices from below her. It was Harry's voice, he was talking to Ginny. Hermione had crouched down, knowing it was wrong to listen but being unable to stop herself all the same. She just wanted to hear him be happy.

"I don't care if we're at war, Harry. If anything, it makes me want to say it all the more. You know how I feel about you." She could hear the fierceness in Ginny's whisper. Hermione had always admired the way that she ceaselessly plunged forward, always so sure and confident, always reaching towards something hopeful.

"Ginny." Harry's low voice crept up the stairs to her, filled with care and concern and longing.

"I want nothing more than to be with you, nothing more. But we can't ignore that we are heading into a battle for our lives. It's not going to be easy for anyone. Starting something now, it would only be painful. And if there are ten words I never want to have to say to you they're 'I love you, I love you, I love you, goodbye.'" She could hear the sadness deep in his words. It made her want to cry. She had climbed back up the stairs after that, unwilling to listen to the rest.

It was all Hermione could think of when she saw Ginny's crumpled body in Harry's arms. I love you, I love you, I love you, goodbye. She wanted to scream, to fall apart and cry. Harry gently laid her on the ground, and she saw the words there on his lips, those words he never wanted to say. He rose, so slowly, so painfully slowly, as if dragging the weight of the whole world with him. In the moment she thought he must have been. Hermione could only follow as he ran towards Voldemort, their spells colliding, then their bodies colliding, forced over the edge of the cliff, neither one able to fight the fall. Hermione fell to her knees at the edge, watching them go down, forever down, neither able to move, locked in an eternal embrace, both knowing it was over, and that it would never end. She couldn't look away from their mangled bodies on the rocks below. She couldn't reconcile the silence that followed as the Death Eaters dropped their fights, deflated, shocked, defeated with their master. She couldn't find comfort in the hands that pulled her away from the cliff and held her close. She couldn't breath. She was drowning and she couldn't breath –

Hermione's eyes flew open as she gasped for air, pushing the tangled sheets and blankets off of her body. She was covered in sweat. Her pulse raced, and she stumbled over to the balcony door in her suite and shoved open the glass, feeling the cool night air tumble over her. Her hands caught the stone railing as she steadied herself in the moonlight. She held herself there, in the cold and the quiet, as her breathing returned to normal, and only then did she reach up to tuck her hair behind her ear. It had gotten so long, falling just past her ribcage. She didn't care, though, it looked better this way, less bushy and tangled.

Her eyes pulled out across the Hogwarts grounds. A thin sheet of snow covered the grass, turning it to glittering stone. Perhaps this place was a shelter once more, but it would never be scrubbed clean of the horrible memories. Raking her hands through her hair, she turned to the side to see Malfoy casually leaning against his balcony, staring at her. Surprised she stood there looking back at him. He looked wary and unsure, as if some terror in the night had woken him up as well. She turned and walked back inside, closing the door behind her and climbing back into bed.

She pulled the blankets closer around her, unable to shake the image of his eyes, silver like they held the moon within them. She was unsure why she felt so disconcerted around him. He seemed so different from the boy she had grown up with. But the cruelty, that was still there. And suddenly she felt furious - the war was over. He had even switched sides at the end, betraying his father and Voldemort. Why did he still feel the need to be so foul to her? She had vowed long ago that she wouldn't let anyone treat her like some undesirable being to be weeded out of the world. If Malfoy wanted to play mean, he would find out just who he was dealing with. She smiled, remembering that time in her third year when she had punched him in the face. She hoped he remembered it as well.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: It is I, your everyday average college student. No. I don't own the characters.**

 **AN: Okay, here is chapter 2, updated and reconfigured. I love laughing about how awful this used to be! Let me know what you think of it NOW.**

Chapter Two

 _We forge the chains_

 _we wear in life._

Charles Dickens

Wind pressed itself against the window, raking its palms across the glass as if in a desperate attempt to be seen. Hermione sat wrapped in a blanket as she lay on the floor, her eyes wandering the stormy sky outside as the glass vibrated in front of her. Saturday stretched itself out, pulling its hours thin and spindling its viscous minutes. It was midday and not a drop of sunlight leaked through the grey covering of clouds. She had no idea what to do with herself, having finished all her homework, so she sat and she watched for the slight shifts of gray.

Not knowing what else to do, she stood up and wandered into her closet. It was far too big for all of her possessions, but she was glad for the extra space. The emptiness made her feel like there was the possibility of filling it. Hermione was beginning to see that in herself, too. She sifted through her drawers, looking for something to do with her time when her fingers knocked against something cold and hard. It was her camera. Blinking, she was suddenly struck by the fact that she owned no wizarding photographs. Any that she had had were long gone after the war. Turning the camera over in her hands the weight of it in her palm felt comfortable, a solidness she hadn't known she'd been longing for. Hermione liked taking pictures; in a way it made her feel powerful. The ability to capture a moment forever, tear out a page of time and keep it, as if she were stealing something from out of the grasp of the nature of the universe.

Setting it down, she quickly tore off her loose tank top and sleep shorts, pulling on black jeans and a grey flannel, toppling over as she tried to pull on her boots. She lay there, sprawled out on wooden floorboards. As she studies the lines of the ceiling she fought with the part of her that wanted nothing more than to stay there. Her chest felt so heavy and weighted with crushing thoughts that clawed at her mind. She closed her eyes, trying to push them away, make them stay down. She had to choose to go forward. If she didn't, she would only lose herself to defeat and she would rather lose herself to trying. So she pulled her boots the rest of the way on, grabbed the camera, stood, and stepped out the door.

Her quiet footsteps faltered as she walked into the common room. Malfoy sat on the couch, hunched over, his head in his hands and his shoulders shaking. He obviously hadn't noticed her entrance. He was crying. Hermione could hardly think of a single time she'd ever seen him let his guard down, let alone cry. For any weakness he had had, he was always one to put up a pretense of inextricable strength. Right now, as she silently watched him silently cry, he had never looked more human.

"Are you –" she began, "is everything okay?"

He whipped his head around, fear and surprise etched into his features. However, he quickly recovered, his face falling back into its arrogant and ruthless mask. Even now, his eyes red and his hair messy, he was handsome, all cheekbones and curling lips. She hadn't noticed him turning into a man. All the girls lusted for him and Hermione could see why, she wasn't blind. Which was why she also saw what a wretched person he was. Looks are only genetics, after all. Malfoy had always been cruel and pretentious. But for that one moment, when he hadn't known she was there, she almost felt like she had been looking at a completely different person.

"What do you want, Granger?" He stood, turning back turned to her, his voice harsh and filled with resentment. She paused a moment to notice how tall he'd become. Tall and muscular.

"Nothing," she said, watching him curiously. "You just seemed a bit –" She paused, knowing she should choose her words carefully. "Unhappy." She glanced at his figure, the tension painfully visible in his muscles as he stood rooted to the spot.

"How high and mighty of you." He rounded on her in a slow and infuriatingly graceful way, his eyes burning holes through her own. "Since when have you ever cared if I'm happy?"

He spat the word at her as if it were something dirty, but his face was unreadable as he gazed down on her. Did he think she was taking pleasure from this? Did he honestly believe that she hated him so much that she would enjoy watching him cry? Or maybe it was simply that he expected that from everyone.

"You know, Malfoy, I'm starting to wonder which one of us actually hates you here, you or me."

His whole body stilled. Anger flashed in his eyes like a whip of lightening. She braced herself, not sure what to expect. Her hand hovered by her pocket, poised to grab her wand. Instead, though, he just stood there, speechless, staring at her. Unsure of what else to do, Hermione turned and left the room, stopping only when the portrait had swung shut behind her.

She pressed her hand to her chest. Her heart was clamoring, banging against her ribs like it was trying to escape her. Why did she feel so shaken? She laughed for even wondering the question - the answer was so obvious. She had never seen Malfoy behave like that, not once in her seven years of knowing him. Besides the crying, she had left him speechless, something she never thought the fair-haired boy was capable of being. It was becoming more and more apparent to her that she didn't know Malfoy at all. But that's the thing about people; we only see what they allow us to.

Pushing the whole thing from her mind, Hermione began to walk down the hallways, her eyes catching on the soft grey light as it pooled in the air before her. The further she wandered, the more she felt alive in a gentle sort of way, a little bit more like herself. She stopped now and again to take pictures of the things she didn't want to forget, of the illuminated stonework and the dust moving in slow decent through the shafts of brightness. Beauty hid in all the corners of the world, waiting patiently to be seen.

She wandered through the castle, losing herself in its twists and turns, stumbling upon rooms and halls she had never seen before as the daylight slowly bled out of the clouds and she wondered why she had never done this before. Walking with peaceful footsteps, absorbing the quiet, melting into the air. Everything in this castle was so intricately connected, like a living, breathing body. It was late afternoon when she decided she should try and figure her way back to the Great Hall for dinner. She wandered to the end of the hallway she was in, trying to gather her bearings.

A few minutes later she passed an old wooden door with a rusty latch. There was nothing peculiar about it; it was simply a door like any other. And yet, almost involuntarily she stopped, her eyes fixed upon it. As she stared at it she couldn't figure out why she was so curious, tracing down the simple grain of it wood. It was probably just a broom closet, nothing at all to be fascinated by. She forced herself to tear her eyes away, nearly convincing herself to forget about it, but after a few steps she turned back. Without a second thought, she reached out her trembling hand, pulled the latch down, and pushed the door open.

For a moment, everything was still, the world held its breath. Then, a gust of wind flew across her face, cold and shocking. As it died down, it seemed as if it had wrapped its icy fingers around her arms and was pulling her gently through the doorway. Slowly, Hermione stepped forward. She nearly gasped as her eyes traveled around the room before her. She was standing beneath a portico that ran around the entire octagonal room. Ornately carved stone pillars depicting Roman gods and goddesses stood at intervals, each looking towards the center. She took another step, only to stop once again as she caught a glimpse of movement out of the corner of her eye. Turning her head, she started into her own wide-eyed reflection, the door softly clicking shut behind her. Every wall was a mirror, splotchy and misted, worn with time. But her focus was once again pulled toward the center.

Another gust of chilling wind blew against Hermione's skin, and a flurry of soft blue petals danced skyward. They littered the ground of the open courtyard, glowing in the faint evening light. Hermione emerged from under the portico, the turrets of the castle rising in a wide circle around the room, up into the darkening sky. Climbing the two steps that led up onto the raised center platform, Hermione's vision was engulfed by the boughs of the tall tree that stood in front of her. Blossoms of brilliant blue flowers hung from every branch, emitting a divine and fragile scent into the cool air.

Hermione had never seen anything like it before. Her breath came out in clouds, dissipating with the faint breeze that tousled her hair. The tree looked like it had been woven together, as if each strand of its ivory colored bark had been immaculately laid down, one after another. The petals of the blossoms seemed to emit their own light, like fragments of stars encased in blue glass. Hermione couldn't help but feel that she wasn't supposed to be here, yet how could she care? She couldn't even look away. She walked up to the tree, feeling lighter than air, and ran her had across its smooth trunk. She immediately felt calmed by its contact, as if the sorrows and fears that plagued her mind were somehow healed, tossed out of her thoughts, lifted somewhere far, far away.

Sighing, she reluctantly pulled herself away. Her stomach was painfully empty, as she hadn't actually eaten anything all day. She hungrily gazed around the room once more, wanting to stay and wanting to leave. Lifting her camera, she stole the moment so it would be hers forever, then walked back out the door, her reflection chasing after her with every step.

xxxxx

Her eyes searched the Gryffindor table until they found Ron, who was talking to Dean and a few others. She quietly sat down beside her best friend and started pulling food onto her plate. She looked up a moment later at the shock of silence permeating from the group around her. Everyone was staring at her.

"What?" She looked at them blankly. Ron was the first to answer, raising his eyebrows at her.

"You're eating," he said, and a grin suddenly broke out across his face. Hermione smiled back at him, deliberately taking a bite out of her bread. Everyone else finally seemed to get a grip on themselves and resumed their conversations, and Hermione, she just disappeared into a moment that felt so wonderfully normal. Every bite she took tasted like a victory.

Her gaze traveled around the faces of her friends. There was so much determination in their eyes. They were all struggling, all of them. Even this room, so full of human noise and laughter and smiling, innocent faces – the past hung over them like a muted shroud. She blushed hard as she realized she was staring at Dean, and he was staring back at her. She quickly turned her eyes away, but when she glanced back, he was still looking at her. A small smile tugged at his mouth, and she was suddenly struck by how handsome he was. He was no longer boyish and gangly, but solid – all angles, with a strong jaw and tempting lips. Unbidden, images of fierce grey eyes tore through her mind, the feel of Malfoy's strong, broad shoulders beneath her fingers. She nearly choked on her food. Whatever that was, it had to stop. Malfoy was – harsh and unknown. She had no desire to walk into that hell. Right?


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: I remain NOT JK Rowling, at this time. Thank you.**

 **AN: Hello people! Here we go, Chapter 3. By all means, let me know what you think in the reviews! Thats about all, so read on, friends.**

Chapter Three

 _Easy is the decent to hell_

 _But it is a long and unconquerable pain_

 _To withdraw one's steps and the upper world regain_

Virgil

Hermione lay in bed, too comfortable under the soft down blanket that seemed to swallow her away from the world. The sun brandished itself through the window. For a while, she simply stared at the way is threaded itself through the white chiffon curtains that hung with the promise of soft motions before her balcony doors. Raising a hand above the blankets, she examined it. It was marred with shadows that voyaged across her palm when she turned it. Her eyes drifted down to the stark white scar carved into her arm. Mudblood. She was so warm under the blankets, safe, she could pretend that the world began and ended with her own thoughts here.

Sometimes she hated caring about all the living, breathing things beyond her door. The mind is so selfish, but is that really so awful? All we have is our own selves. We aren't guaranteed anyone or anything else. She had been taught that one the hard way. For a moment, she squeezed her eyes shut, then pushed the covers off with violent determination and stepped out in front of the window, yanking the curtains aside. Light poured down from the sky like liquid, blazing defiantly on the winter below. The sun didn't matter, though, not really. The cold was still queen beyond the glass. The sun was just a trick.

She had potions class, defense against the dark arts, and transfiguration today. That felt like a joke too. It seemed that all she was doing anymore was working to satisfy her teachers. She'd already learned the value of those subjects in the real world, already knew more than what she was being taught, more than most of the people in her class would ever have to know. Now it just felt like playing a game, playing Perfect Student. Where had her sense of excitement disappeared to? Was it gone? Would she never feel it again? It had fled from under the sharp stabs of reality. But nevertheless, she knew it was important to keep up with her classes, to resume old habits - the things that had once made her feel whole. She wanted to find that in herself again, wanted to feel proud of her perfect grades instead of just having them and wondering absently what the teachers would do if she failed on purpose. The thought made her laugh.

xxxxx

Hermione found herself too lost in thought to notice breakfast. She felt as though her mind was on the verge of snapping, like her thoughts were so chaotic they would overwhelm her mind and bury her alive, screaming and unable to understand them all. She walked with her fellow Gryffindors to the potions classroom, not noticing whatever trivial words it was they had dripping from their mouths today. As they entered the classroom, Hermione threw her things on the nearest workbench, feeling particularly out of fucks to give. Dean sat down next to her. She had always liked Dean, he came from the muggle world too, and was fairly smart. They had always seemed to understand one another. These days Hermione wondered if anyone could understand her. She didn't know if she even understood herself.

"Morning," he said, and his voice was warm, like a smoky campfire. She liked that too.

"Good morning," she replied, her voice empty and automatic. Lovely.

"You've been lost in thought since breakfast. What's up?" She looked up at him, surprised he was being so blunt. She was used to people avoiding asking her questions, but here he was, looking her straight in the face, calm, and asking them.

"I – it's nothing, really." How could she even attempt to explain what was going through her head? And if she did, would he even get it? She wasn't interested in pity or platitudes.

"Doesn't seem like nothing." He was looking at her the way she looked at books.

Why was it so hard for her to answer him? Maybe she didn't want to place her pain on his shoulders. Maybe she didn't want to show vulnerability. Maybe she just didn't care enough to speak. Maybe she cared too much. She was spared having to come up with an answer as Professor Slughorn traipsed into the room.

And so commenced Honors Advanced Potions. Absently, she wondered why Malfoy wasn't in this class - he had always been particularly talented at potions. Then again, it was only the second week and the add/drop period hadn't yet ended for 7th years. But why was she even thinking about him at all? What the bloody hell should she care what classes he takes? She felt angry at her thoughts for wandering to him, and she couldn't figure out why they did. Maybe it was because Draco Malfoy was an enigma. No one really knew him, he didn't even let his so-called friends, back when there were any really left, close enough to really see him. Hermione supposed she was just curious, she had always liked puzzles. But Draco Malfoy wasn't a puzzle, he was a person. A person who had spent every second he'd known her trying to make her feel inferior, as if her existence was an insult. She stiffened in her seat. She had completely missed the instructions. She glanced nervously at Dean. He was smirking at her, and she felt so unlike herself.

"Relax," he said, with a smile, "we're making Veritaserum today." She couldn't help herself, she smiled right back. It was so unlike her to not pay attention. And that moment of smiling and worrying about things as simple as potions class felt so light hearted that she didn't think it could be real, like it must belong to someone else.

They set about preparing ingredients; Veritaserum was a difficult potion to brew, and after they had made it, they would have to check in on it throughout the entire lunar phase to be sure it matured correctly.

"Do you ever think about how…" he hesitated, looking at the assortment of strange ingredients in front of him. He turned towards her. "How strange it is that we actually consume these vile concoctions?"

"When I first read about potions, I thought the wizarding world must be bat shit crazy. But what's worse, I think, is that some of these potions actually turn out tasting sort of really good." She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye, and they both bust out laughing.

"My mum nearly had a stroke when I told her some of the things we use in here. Sometimes it still baffles me how it all works out." His brow furrowed as he continued to chop and grind. "Magic."

"Magic." They smiled at each other, but there was something else in his eyes as he looked at her then, something deeper. Feeling suddenly too aware of herself, she blushed, turning away from him.

There were a few moments of comfortable silence as they both concentrated on brewing the potion correctly. Eventually, they sat down, waiting for the potion to boil, which would take half an hour. They fell into easy conversation, and Hermione felt relieved to notice that she felt no pressure around him. She didn't have to try to keep up appearances, he saw right through them anyway.

"I think this is probably out of line for me to say, but I just want to say it. You know that it's okay to be sad, right?" Dean looked at her like he could really see her. He cared. Hermione didn't know what to say so she just watched him instead, noticing the colors and shades of his eyes, like a forest without the green.

"I know we haven't really talked much recently, but I guess what I'm trying to say is that, I understand, at least in part, how difficult this war has been. If you want to be sad, I don't mind. You can be sad with me." There was such a fierceness in his eyes that Hermione almost felt it in the air. What words could she possibly give him that would show how much she appreciated what he had said to her? Nearly everyone just danced around her pain, as if by pretending it didn't exist, it would eventually go away. But here he was facing it head on and telling her that he could handle it.

"Thank you, Dean. I –Thank you." And there it was again, that smile between them. Not all the good people in her life were stolen away. How foolish for her to have thought so.

xxxxx

The long flight of stairs up to the Head's dorm felt particularly strenuous after her classes had ended. She felt so, so tired. Sleep had become something dangerous, it turned her own mind into a weapon against her, forming images that tore her apart over and over as if living them once just wasn't enough torture. Nowadays it seemed that she feared all things safe, so terrified that they could turn tainted with just a touch. But she was so, so, so very tired. The castle seemed to be breathing, very softly, as if to persuade her into sleep. Finally, the portrait hole loomed in front of her. She felt like she could cry. As the portrait swung open, she heard soft noises from within. Curious, she stepped inside, her mind moving slower than her feet. She stopped just through the entrance when she saw what greeted her within. A shirtless Malfoy had a pretty brunette pressed against the bookcases, kissing her neck while she quietly moaned his name.

"Oh, hello," Hermione said, crossing her arms and putting on an innocent smile.

"Lovely day, isn't it?" It was all she could do not to laugh, as she tilted her head to the side, the image of purity. Malfoy looked over and glared at her, as if she were intruding on his private quarters. This was the fucking common room. Prat.

"What do you want, Granger?" He pulled away from the girl, who was glaring at Hermione like she could shoot poison out of her eyes. What a sight that would be.

"Oh! Have I interrupted? I'm so sorry. Please, by all means, continue. Seeing how you have no qualms about using the common room as your own personal sex den, I'll just go ahead and read this in your room, hmm Malfoy? So nice to know privacy means nothing to you." Without allowing him time to respond, she ripped a book off the shelf and sauntered towards his bedroom, leaving him seething behind her. Faintly she heard him telling the girl to leave. She opened the door to his room and stepped inside, her eyes traveling around curiously. Her parents had always told her that you could tell a lot about a person by their bedroom, that it was a reflection of who they were underneath the surface. But you wouldn't even have been able to guess that someone lived here. There were no personal items in sight. It felt so – empty. Again, Hermione was reminded of how little she knew about the boy she lived with.

Frustrated voices carried up to her from the common room but she barely took notice. She stepped further into the room, looking around. The bed was perfectly made, white comforter pulled flat, crisply tucked and folded. No pictures alighted the walls or rested on the nightstand or dresser. No clothing littered the floor, not even a speck of dust or dirt or anything at all could be seen on the polished dark wood surfaces. The only indication that the space was inhabited at was the soft, enticing smell. It smelled like him. His room smelled like him. Hermione's eyes fell upon a book resting on the nightstand. It looked almost out of place amidst the emptiness. She walked over, her feet making small noises on the floor. It was Virgil's Aenied. Hermione lifted her eyebrows in surprise. Opening it, she saw that it had the original Latin alongside the translated text. The margins were filled with notes, passages underlined, the page overflowing with Malfoy's thoughts and she felt like she had invaded his most intimate moments.

"What are you doing?" His voice was harsher than ice and it clawed down her spine. She quickly shut the book and returned it to the table. She turned to look at him, making her face a mask and nearly jumped at his proximity. He was barely a foot away from her, staring at her with utter loathing. He never seemed to shy away from her eyes just stared into them unwaveringly. It was enough to send a shiver through her body. He hadn't always been this cold. He hadn't always been so hardened that he seemed nearly unreachable. Hermione realized, looking up at him, his hateful glare sending her heart into a frenzy, that all of his hostility was probably just the walls of defense he had erected for himself. As much as she wanted to despise him, she couldn't. He had been through hell, too.

"I'm sorry." She blushed, suddenly feeling awkward for invading his room. His eyes widened, obviously neither of them had expected that to come out of her mouth.

"I shouldn't have just barged into your room like this. It was inconsiderate, really. I was just so frustrated with your complete disregard of my existence. The common room belongs to both of us – I live here too. It's disrespectful to grope your – friends – in a shared area." She suddenly became overly conscious of the fact that Malfoy was standing in front of her, shirtless. Four red lines ran over his muscular stomach where the girl had raked her nails down to the edge of his dark pants. Hermione swallowed, glancing away. There was a moment of silence that felt far too long.

"I'm… sorry, too." His brow furrowed as if the words tasted wrong in his mouth. They probably did. They looked at each other then, the air between them suddenly crackling with tension as they searched each others eyes, in a manner too hungry to be casual.

"Are you planning on standing in my room forever, Granger?" His words were harsh, but some of the acid behind them had disappeared.

"Well I don't know why I'd stay," Hermione replied, monotone and blank-faced. "It's not as if your room is all that…" She cocked an eyebrow, "thrilling." She gestured around at the stark white walls and empty surfaces. Malfoy's jaw tightened and he looked away. Hermione carefully stepped around him and left. Her head felt light as she nearly ran through the common room and up the stairs to her own bedroom. She looked around, realizing she had little to criticize in Malfoy. There were barely any signs of her presence here. It caused an unsettling feeling in her stomach, that in some small way her and Malfoy were the same. They lived like ghosts, hardly marking the physical world, as if their existences were scarcely real at all. She leaned against the door. She was just as empty as he was.

xxxxx

Hermione ran her fingers along the page in her hand, watching the way she almost believed she could touch somehow the light laying itself down upon the ancient stone of the Hogwarts corridor. She glanced up at the chaos she had created in her common room. Strings hung with photographs laced haphazardly through the open space, moments of a castle contained within a room. Sometime around 4am she had resolved to develop the photos she'd taken when she decided that, no, she really definitely couldn't get to sleep. The morning was just beginning to slide its way through the tall glass panes across from where she sat on the floor two hours later.

"What – Granger, it's a common room, not a maze. And what the hell are these?" She glanced over to see Malfoy ducking under one of the strings of photographs. He moved closer to her with an annoyed frown, glancing around at the images surrounding him.

"They're photographs," she said, her voice coming out dry and scratchy from lack of sleep.

"Oh, are they? I hadn't noticed." He shot her a glare, but it only made her smile. So he wasn't a morning person, then. Turning away from him she returned to her task of spelling the photographs to move. It was a simple enough charm, but required concentration.

"What's the point of turning these into wizarding photographs? They aren't of any people."

"I guess I just like the way the shadows move," she said simply. And she did. She liked the way the dust kept floating down through columns of light, how the colors cast upon stone walls shifted with the movement of the sky through the stained glass windows, how the shade of the pillars slowly moved across the floor with the changing light. She liked that they weren't just images anymore, they were moments.

After a while, she looked up at him, provoked by his silence. He stood between the strings and hanging photographs, one image caught between his fingers with an expression that she couldn't quite decipher but could feel deep in the hollow of her chest. Her hands shook at the sight of him there, wishing that she could capture the way he looked, gold fused into his hair as the morning light pushed its way around him, and he was so still, so intent upon the image in his hands. He looked beautiful. Quickly, she looked away from him, unsure why it made her so unsettled to think of him that way. He was beautiful. She could dislike him and still admit that. It meant nothing. Just observation of fact.

Overwhelmed by the need to know, she set down the photograph in her hands and stood up, ducking under the rows of hanging images until she stood next to him. Looking down, she saw that he held a picture she had taken in the library. Segmented light poured through a stained glass window, falling in front of a shelf of potions texts. She watched as dust swirled in and out of perception amidst the shafts of light. His hands held the image so gently, as if it would break if he gripped it too tightly.

"Can I keep this?" His voice was so soft that Hermione wondered if perhaps she had only imagined it. She looked up at him and nearly lost her breath at the openness she found in his eyes. There was no cruelty there, not anymore, just a soft gray question of could he keep it.

"Yes," she said. And something about that made her heart stutter.


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: I continue to be someone other than JK Rowling.**

 **AN: Thank you SO much to everyone who reviewed and followed this story, it means so much to hear from you all. I'm hoping you'll all stick around and keep reading this old thang and keep on letting me know what you think. I love the attention.**

Chapter 4

 _When we think of the past_

 _It's the beautiful things we pick out_

 _We want to believe_

 _It was all like that_

Margaret Atwood

It had been over a month since Hermione had boarded for the last time she ever would the train bound for Hogwarts. The winter was deep now, the whole world muffled beneath the snow. The air was filled with the sounds of winter – the faint breath of the wind, the sharp scratching of loose snow over the frozen earth, the resonating thuds of branches releasing the white to the ground, the delicate and musical gasping of melting icicles, the lone and hollow calls of owls through the silent skies.

Hermione was stretched out on the floor in front of the fireplace, the warmth washing over her in crackling waves. Ever few minutes she turned over to heat the other side of her body. Her mind was a blank page and she felt almost numb, uninhabited. It was better this way, though, better than the onslaught of thoughts that seemed as though they were trying to take her out at the knees. This was at least a warped and defective peaceful. She was like a forest after a windstorm: bent and broken and so eerily still. Heaving a sigh, she turned over again, staring down the flames. Sometimes she just needed to be pessimistic. If she had learned anything, it was that pain had its value.

She had hardly seen Malfoy in their shared quarters since that morning with the photographs, but she had most certainly heard him – or rather, whichever girl he had decided was good enough to be brought to his room for the night. Apparently his standards included almost the entire female population. Or so it seemed. So far there had been no repeats, not that she was keeping track. She wondered how many girls Malfoy would have to lose himself in before he discovered that the answers he was searching for couldn't be found between their legs.

Shaking off such thoughts, she pulled herself off the floor. Her schoolbooks were piled on the table next to a stack of essays and assignments – another week worth of homework completed to perfection. She smiled sardonically at it. It didn't make her happy at all. Glancing over her shoulder at the fire she considered burning all of it to ashes. Instead, she tucked the loose strands of hair that had fallen out of her messy bun behind her ears. Her eyes traveled to the forlorn gramophone sitting in the corner of the room collecting dust. Wandering over to it, she began flipping through the records stacked chaotically beneath it. She pulled out Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, a small smile pulling at her mouth. Her parents had loved this music. She carefully set the record onto the turntable and flipped it on, placing the needle down with a short buzz of sound. The first notes of "Can't Take My Eyes Off You" spilled into the room. She bit her lip as if she could bite back the memories.

The music soaked into her, and she was suddenly filled with energy and excitement and the need to be alive and wild. Whirling around, she began to dance across the room, singing the words as loud as she could. She leaped up onto the couch as the chorus blared out, loud and clear and exhilarating. It filled up every empty space with a cheerfulness that this room hadn't seen in, she suspected, a very long time. Jumping off the couch, she spun about, singing the song as if she'd written it herself, not caring if she looked like a right fool. As the trumpets of the second chorus exploded outward, Malfoy's door swung open and he stared open mouthed out at her. But fuck it, the boy could damn well deal with it. Laughing, she sang the chorus, twirling around the room with flourish. Yeah, let him look. The icy bastard probably didn't know the meaning of 'breaking loose' anyway, this could be a valuable learning experience for him. As the last sultry words poured out of the gramophone, Hermione turned back to him, singing straight at him. A surprised smile was plastered across his face, the type of boyish smile she'd never seen on him before. Malfoy had never looked so young and carefree. It almost made her sad.

"You're crazy, Granger, do you know that?" He said, but there wasn't a hint of malice to it. The record began to turn out the beginning beats of "I Make A Fool Of Myself", and Hermione couldn't help but to smile back at him. She began slowly moving her shoulders with the music, then stepped towards him ever so slowly.

"Yes of course I know I'm crazy. Come on, Malfoy," her voice was taunting and playful. "Break loose." She smirked, daring him to, beckoning with one finger, completely shocked at herself. Maybe it was that bright smile of his. His eyes narrowed, and suddenly that smile became dangerous. He stalked towards her, predatory. Before she realized what was happening, he swept her into his arms, pulling her into a sort of waltz that carried them all around the room.

"You realize this behavior is insane, Granger." His eyes never left hers.

"Fuck it, then" she said, "let's go mental." She challenged him with her eyes and spun out into a twirl. He pulled her back to him, closer than before. She was surprised by what a good dancer he was, and silently thanked her parents for paying for lessons all those years before Hogwarts. It was the dance of devils between them, neither able to allow themselves to be outdone by the other. Hermione stepped outward, spinning all the way around him, his hand gently holding hers, until she ended with her back against his chest. She dropped into a low side lunge, her leg nearly parallel with the floor, and slowly rose back up, turning to face him, and pulling him right back into their waltz. Malfoy's face was riot of emotions, filled with humor and competitiveness and something else she couldn't quite catch, but that was reflected back at him in her eyes.

Suddenly, he lifted her into the air, holding her up and spinning her around before gracefully setting her back on her feet. They moved across the room like that – waltzing and twirling, forgetting about the past, forgetting about everything, and what a beautifully deceitful moment it was. As the song tumbled to an end, Malfoy dipped her low to the ground, staying there with one hand around her waist and the other tangled in her hair until their heavy breaths were the only sounds left in the room. For a moment, he wanted to pull her closer, to not let her go, to not let this moment fade away into the vault of forgotten moments for her. He would never forget. The thought burned him and he dropped her, letting her fall from his hands to the floor.

"Ouch, Malfoy!" Hermione glared up at him, refusing to let the pain shooting up her arm from her elbow appear on her face. He was looking down at her with pure rage and loathing, but she couldn't tell it if was directed at her or himself. He looked about ready to kick her, and for a short instant, she was afraid he would. But there was nothing that he could do to her, no pain he could cause her that would ever rival that which she had already been through. She stared into his silver eyes that burned and flashed like metal. It suddenly didn't matter that she was on the floor and he was towering over her. Malfoy felt the air evaporate from his lungs. There was fire in her eyes. He realized then that this small and vulnerable girl cast to the floor at his feet – she had fire in her eyes. He turned and walked away, unable to stand the heat of her gaze.

xxxxx

Hermione woke up to pounding on her door. For a moment, she lay still, disoriented and tangled in her sheets. Images of her dream were still printed across the darkness before her, alive again within the shadows of her room. It was a dream she'd had before. One that haunted the back of her mind. She shuddered as she rose from her bed, the cool air seeping into her skin, damp from sweat. It was a dream where she didn't exist, had never existed. A world like the one her own parents now inhabited. A world where she couldn't remember the name of a girl that never was. Her own name. She walked to the door, feeling that her footsteps sounded too light for all that she carried inside her. Bracing herself, she pulled the door open to find a disheveled Malfoy was standing in front of her. His hair was a mess, untidy in a strangely endearing way as he stood there wearing only sweatpants and a bewildered scowl.

"What the blimmin hell?" His voice came out between clenched teeth, but there was worry behind his eyes as he looked down at her. She stood there, her face fierce as if she were preparing herself to fight a hoard of resurrected death eaters. The sight almost caused him pain – she was always prepared for the worst, she could never just rest easy.

"What do you mean? You're the one who's pounding on my door in the middle of the night." Her furious gaze appraised him, and suddenly he felt self-conscious.

"You were screaming your head off." He said, his voice low. She blushed, but refused to look away from him. Daringly, she raised an eyebrow.

"Yes. And?" Her voice came out stony and unwavering. Good.

"And shut up, will you?" He grabbed the door and slammed it in her face. He stood there for a long time, knowing she was standing there too, just as surprised as he was, separated by only a few inches of flimsy wood. Eventually he heard her walk back to her bed. His heart was still beating like a metronome in his chest. He had been afraid that something had happened to her. He had heard people scream like that before, heard it far too often. He shook his head, running his hands through his hair. He didn't want to revisit those times, not with her or anyone. He had made his choice in the end, he had betrayed his family and Voldemort before the battle at Hogwarts, but a part of him still wondered why. It was easy to blame it on what had happened to his mother, but he knew underneath it all that the reason was something more. He needed it to be something more.

Turning, he walked back across the common room to his door. Opening it, he gazed silently inward, standing there in the doorframe. She had been right; his room was as cold and empty as he was. He slammed his fist into the wall, cursing silently. He hated the way that she always got under his skin so easily. Everything inside of him felt like it was burning to the ground, he had nothing left to stand on and he was falling. But it had been like this his whole life - he was no stranger to pain or torture of any form. For a moment, he realized that neither was she. They were both haunted by their pasts. He didn't need to guess why she had been screaming. Standing there, despite the strength in her eyes, she had looked like she'd spent hours tossing in her bed, controlled by the hell inside her thoughts. He scoffed, knowing the feeling all too well. Maybe they weren't so different after all.

Closing his door behind him he walked across his barren desert of a room and sat at the edge of the bed. He was losing faith that he had the strength to keep this up, to keep denying – no. His eyes glanced around the room again, met by stark whites and listless shadows and then, there it was, hanging against the wall, the only touch of color in the whole damn place. Her photograph. He had gone there, to that corner of the library, sat for hours waiting to see the light the way that she did, the way that she had inexplicably captured in that image. He had been ready to give up when suddenly there it was, the world through her eyes, and finding that somewhere in himself he could see it the way that she could, the dust and the light and the books and all of it, it was hope. Out of the hell he had created and been a part of, his faith was there hanging on the wall.

xxxxx

Hermione found herself once again sitting outside in a snowstorm. The darkness of the night was pressed away by the moon sitting high above her. She closed her eyes, listening to the snow falling, the sound changing with the wind. There was something calming about the cold. As much as it tried to eat away at her, she just felt a part of it. It had been two days since Malfoy had woken her from her nightmare. They hadn't spoken. Not even once. Not that that was unusual for them. Silence was better. Silence was safer. She suddenly felt overly warm, so hot that her cloak felt like it was smothering her. So she pulled it off her body and left it discarded on the ground behind her.

Hermione stood by the edge of the lake, the water creeping into the ground by her feet. It never seemed to freeze in the winter, not with ice anyway. She looked out over the dark water – it seemed to shine and sway as if great waves were forming and dying upon its surface. She wondered absently if her mind was playing tricks on her.

"Glacius," Hermione muttered, her wand pointed down toward the lake. Her voice seemed unusually loud among the falling snowflakes. Several feet of water in front of her froze solid, several inches thick, as translucent as glass. Tentatively, she stepped onto it and walked forward, whispering the spell over and over as she traveled out onto the lake. It was unnerving, looking down into the water, so clear and unobscured. Every now and then, she would see strange shadows moving through the water, too far down to understand, flashes of movements far beneath her. Further and further she walked out onto the lake upon her frozen pathway. The falling snow vanished into the water, pulled apart by its movement a few feet to either side of her. When she glanced behind her, the motionless ice had already begun to accumulate a layer of white, as pure as the clouds. She didn't want to go back.

For a minute, just a minute she promised herself, she sunk to her knees on the ice, feeling so overwhelmingly hot she feared it might melt beneath her. She gazed downward into nothing. The water was unreadable, a vast depth of mystery and emptiness. She watched the vacant lake, her hands pressing down on the ice that was too like a window into a strange world. Something seemed to be rising towards the surface, a faint shadow growing larger. She could see her hollow breath collecting in the air around her. The shadow was beginning to take shape – it was moving, like something alive clawing its way towards her from the frigid depths below. For a moment, her vision went blurry, her head swimming with static, everything leaning towards black.

"No," she shook her head, desperate to see the shadow take form. She closed her eyes, taking a deep steadying breath. She opened them. Her voice stuck in her throat, she couldn't scream, she wanted to scream, she needed to scream. It was Fred Weasley's face beneath the ice. He stared up at her, desperation livid in his eyes, his mouth gaping open, his hands clawing and pounding to break the surface. Horror seized her as she watched him fighting just below her outspread palms. No. He was dead. Fred Weasley was dead. A long, agonized scream filled the air – it was her voice. She stood, unsteady, the world swaying as she stumbled backwards, her feet unsure upon the ice. Her throat felt raw but her cries continued to scourge the air. She couldn't tear her eyes away from his gasping face, his lips moving soundlessly but she knew he was begging her for help. She had to help. No. No. No. She couldn't leave him there. She couldn't. She raised her wand, ready to blast apart the ice, when she heard movement behind her, the sounds of quick footsteps. Before she could react, arms encircled her, pulling her wand from her quaking hands. She couldn't even fight it, she felt weak, like her legs would betray her.

"Stop it, no! I have to save him! You don't understand, I have to do it. I have to save him. Please, just let me save him. You have to let me save him." Tears streamed down her cheeks like trails of ice as she screamed the words, struggling against the arms to break free.

"Hermione stop!" The voice yelled, familiar.

The world was collapsing around her, fading away, her vision blurred by her tears. She felt herself being lifted into the air, supported by the strong arms that carried her, moving steadily back across the ice towards the shore. She looked backwards, cheek resting against a hard, warm shoulder, eyes fixated on the ice where Fred was struggling, pounding his fists upon a surface that would not break, the last few feeble bubbles of air escaping his lips, blue from the cold. The arms shifted, and suddenly she couldn't see him, she couldn't see Fred. She tilted her head back, looking past the black clad shoulders to where Fred was still struggling. But he wasn't there. Nothing was there. It was just dark empty water, and hard unrelenting ice. She looked up into steely grey eyes.

"Malfoy." Her voice sounded thick and confused. His eyes were angry and bright with unfathomable things. The world closed into darkness and silence and nothing at all.

 ***Special shoutout to DrMoon and afewmistakesago for your amazingly sweet reviews of last chapter 3**


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer: Hello, my name is not JK Rowling, how are you?**

 **AN: It's my birthday! Leave a review :) Hope you all enjoy this chapter.**

Chapter 5

 _Behold me waiting – waiting for the knife_

 _The thick, sweet mystery of chloroform,_

 _The drunken dark, the little death-in-life_

 _Face to face with chance_

William Ernest Henley

"I don't understand. What happened?" Hermione's voice came out hoarse and breathy. Her whole body felt exhausted as she sat up. The scratchy red fabric of the Gryffindor common room couch felt harsh beneath her palms. She immediately reached up to clutch her pounding head.

"Um, well, it was my fault," Ron said, holding out a glass of water, "you were so – so yourself again, and you kept on knocking back jello shots. I should have stopped you, I just – I wasn't thinking. And then you were just gone, and I assumed you'd headed off to bed, but then Malfoy showed up, and you were crying and so bloody drunk. And –"

"Wait. Wait. Just – wait." She grabbed the water from his hand and held it to her mouth, sipping it slowly while her thoughts moved like freight trains through her head.

Images of the night before began to resurface in her mind – the ice, as clear as air, the swaying water, the face she had seen beneath the surface, the clawing hands, and Malfoy - Malfoy's strong arms carrying her away from it all. Then nothing. She must have gone black out. She took a deep breath, understanding suddenly why you were supposed to stay home when you were drinking too much. Absently she wondered why her mind always seemed to conjure such horrifying things. But a different question was pressing on her. Why had Malfoy been there in the first place? Collapsing backwards on the couch, exhausted, she ran her fingers through her hair. She was too tired to try and answer something so perplexing. Maybe it was just a coincidence. Maybe he was stalking her. Closing her eyes on it she pushed it to the back of her mind.

"It really isn't your fault, Ron. It's mine. I was irresponsible and obviously stupid enough to think that frolicking about the lake drunk in the middle of the night was a decent idea." Her fingers deftly tried to rub the headache away.

"That's what happened?" She looked up at the guilt hinging his voice.

"Yes. I was hot and wanted to be outside. I – well it doesn't really matter. Malfoy found me before I did something really dumb and obviously he must have brought me back here. Didn't he say?" Ron looked away from her then, running a hand through his hair.

"I – I didn't give him a chance to. When I saw that you were crying, I jumped to conclusions and kind of blew up at him."

Hermione wanted to throw the water in his face. Why would he have thought that Draco, having made her cry, would then be nice enough to drop her off in a safe place to be looked after by her friends? Idiot.

"Well. That was…" she trailed off, not trusting herself to be a kind individual just then.

"Prejudiced," he finished for her. And they both sat there, sinking into the awareness that peace after war would only be achieved through acceptance and open mindedness from both sides.

xxxxx

Hermione repositioned herself on the couch once again, her limbs restless from lack of activity. She had spent the whole of her Sunday in the common room completing every homework assignment she could find that was due in the coming weeks, hoping to run into Malfoy. Not once had she seen him since her Friday night trip to Crazy Town and her mind had been a whirlwind of questions given nothing but time. Why had he been by the lake? For the past two days she had been sinking into a coma of thoughts, things that she hadn't wanted to face that had caught up with her. Doubts and sadness and fears had overwhelmed her every night. But it had felt so good to cry, let it all be washed away somehow. Now, she just felt was tired and oddly restored and all she wanted was answers. She wished Malfoy would come back from wherever he was already.

Living with him had been far from what she expected. He was quiet and thoughtful when he believed she wasn't looking, but she noticed how many of the common room books he had read, noticed how his hands ached to write his thoughts in their margins. He was still volatile, but she was starting to see something else within it, some deeper reason that made her despise him a little less. More than anything else, he was lost. She could see it in every step that to the rest of the world appeared so sure. Guilt settled deep in her bones. She had never thought about what it was like to be the child of a death eater. Turning over onto her side, she pulled her knees closer to her body. She would never know. But when she looked into his eyes, she saw a glimpse of it – the internal defeat.

She'd been spending too much time doing nothing. She had watched from the common room couch as the light had bled out of the room. But Hermione felt content in this darkness, as if she had chosen it. Her head was beginning to pound with the onslaught of prying thoughts. She needed to do something, to go somewhere. Wandering out of the room, she realized that dinner was well underway and suddenly she was starving. As she walked through the deserted hallways, she felt as though she might not really exist, as though she was just a twisted dream thought up by something unimaginable. The castle moved around her, but her eyes didn't see it, not really. Sometimes she spent too much time in her head. But maybe there's no such thing. Bright and glowing lights, the sounds of voices and laughter, the heavy feel of the doors beneath her fingers, the sense of watchful and curious eyes on her every footstep – it was all was dull to her senses. She sat down next to Ron, and he reached out under the table and squeezed her hand.

"Glad you're feeling better," he said as he smiled warmly at her. Her best friend. She squeezed his hand back, returning his smile. Looking at him, him looking back, she knew that the same things had been running a loop through Ron's head. How wrong they had been. Wrong about him. Her eyes searched the Slytherin table until they found the familiar pale hair of Malfoy. His eyes met hers for an instant, and the way he looked at her, Hermione felt completely exposed – naked.

"Hermione!" Parvati Patil's voice called out from down the table. Pulling her eyes from Malfoy's, Hermione leaned backward to see her around Ron. Parvati smiled at her in an artfully devious way, and Hermione was immediately suspicious.

"It's my birthday," Parvati said, and the sinking feeling went into free fall. "We're having a huge party in the common room tonight. Come." Oh no. Hermione didn't think she could have said no even if she had tried. The way Parvati had said it, it was practically an order. Hermione nodded her head yes and Parvati grinned like a fox, rising from the table. No way in hell would be she drinking a single thing at that party.

"Oh, I'm so happy you agreed." The guile in Parvati's voice was impossible to miss as she dragged Hermione to her feet.

"Let's go get ready. We are going to look amazing and crush souls tonight." Quickly grabbing a few bread rolls from the table, Hermione couldn't help but laugh as the vivacious Gryffindor pulled her all the way up to the House tower.

They spent the next two hours trying on all sorts of outfits and laughing hysterically over stories of Parvati's numerous sexual encounters. Hermione was surprised to learn just how many of the top students Parvati had gotten on top of. She was, allegedly, terribly jealous of her sister for being sorted into Ravenclaw with all the 'delicious intellectuals', as she put it. Eventually, Hermione ended up in a fitted red romper with a plunging neckline, and Parvati in a sapphire, backless satin dress. After a few more minutes of Parvati tying Hermione's hair back into an artful half-up do, it was decided that they were fashionably late enough.

"Lets go make all the lads and ladies cry." Parvati said with a wink. As they descended the stairs into the loud music and flashing lights and crowd of dancing people, Hermione let herself feel hopeful that maybe emptiness left by her lost friends could be filled with new ones.

xxxxx

It was well past two in the morning by the time that Hermione began making her way back to the Head dorm. She couldn't keep herself from smiling as she thought about the wild night of dancing and staying well clear of drinking games she had just endured. A blush colored her cheeks as she remembered the way that Dean had danced with her, holding her so close. It had been so different from the way she had danced with Malfoy; there had been no intensity, just an exciting closeness. Dean felt safe, he was fun and caring, and that night, he had stayed with her like she was something precious that he wanted to protect. It felt good. It wasn't electrical or frightening like Malfoy. She shook her head, wondering why she was even comparing the two.

Her thoughts carried her to the portrait hole, and she stopped, laughing like a little girl. Dean really was very handsome. She stumbled into the common room, catching herself on the wall before she fell and giggled at her clumsiness in high heels. Kicking off her shoes, she ran to the couch and threw herself over the back of it onto her stomach. A small noise of surprise escaped her. She had landed instead on the firm chest of Draco Malfoy, a book clutched in his hands. She stared at him wide eyed, aware of how revealing her clothing was. His look of bewildered surprise quickly turned to a smirk.

"We've got to stop meeting like this, Granger."

She felt the low rumble of his voice against her body. He shut the book and tossed it onto the floor, clasping his hands behind his head. Still too stunned to do anything, she stared at him silently, unabashedly observing him. His eyes were the color of storm clouds tonight. She had so many questions she wanted to ask him, but instead, she was consumed with simply staring at him. His cheekbones and long eyelashes, the subtle curve of his mouth in that fucking smirk he wore so well. Her breath hitched as his gaze changed. Suddenly he was looking at her like he was undressing her with his eyes.

"Why were you at the lake?" Her voice was quiet, too soft, but her eyes were intense as she appraised him. A shadow fell across his face at her words.

"Don't get me wrong, I'm perfectly used to girls throwing themselves at me, but really Granger, don't you think it's getting a bit desperate?" His eyes slid over her body, taking in her appearance. As if snapped out of a daze, Hermione launched herself sideways, landing with a thud on the floor. Wincing, she shot him a menacing look.

"As if, Malfoy." She tugged at the corner of his discarded book that stabbed painfully into her back. "And you're avoiding the question." Pulling the leather bound volume from beneath her, she read the title. He was reading Walden by Henry David Thoreau. Unable or unwanting to disguise her shock, she tilted her head back and stared openly at him with raised eyebrows. He tore the book out of her hands and rose from the couch in one fluid motion to stand over her, his eyes darkening.

"Didn't your muggle parents ever teach you any manners? That's the second time you've stuck your nose into my personal business." He gave her a forceful glare and she was again struck by how intimidating he could be. This was a side of Malfoy that Hermione hated to see – this one was bitter and threatening. He was so many things that she could never figure him out. She pulled herself to her feet and returned his icy glare, painfully aware that he was nearly a foot taller than her.

"If you're so insecure about the books that you read, then don't read them in the common room. I don't need you jumping down my throat for having eyes." She felt her hands curl into fists at her sides - she wasn't going to just let him stand there, feeling entitled to insult her very existence just because he couldn't reconcile his own.

"You're the one who attacked me in the first place." He took a step towards her, his eyes burning with anger, turning the color of quicksilver. She couldn't understand why this was making him so enraged, but she refused to be intimidated.

"I had no idea you were on the couch, you pretentious git. It's not as if any of this was intentional." She narrowed her eyes, furiously staring him down. Feeling bold, she took a step towards him as he had done to her. Two could play at that game. They were mere inches apart and the heat between them was suffocating.

"For someone who claims they didn't mean to be on top of me, you sure clung to my chest like you wanted to be." A taunting smirk alighted his face, but his eyes had become guarded and he leaned just that slightest bit closer. She looked at him, appalled.

"Clinging to you?! My, my, it seems your ego is so large we should invest in getting it a room of its own! And I didn't see you pushing me away, so don't act like you're some saint of purity," she bit out, inching closer and closer until she could see every shift of color in his eyes.

"Coming from someone who's thrown themselves on top of me twice." His breath smelled like mint leaves.

"And neither of those times did I actually mean to! Why are you so hung up on this, anyway? Afraid my 'mudblood' grime is going to rub off on you?" She gave him a cold look, making sure he knew he couldn't hurt her with that word, not anymore. He growled, and before she knew what was happening, his hand was in her hair, tilting her head back as he closed the distance between them, kissing her.


	6. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer: A shock to us all, I am not JK Rowling.**

 **AN: Okay, HERE we go folks. Let me know what you think in the comments :)**

Chapter 6

 _The caged bird sings_

 _With a fearful trill_

 _For things unknown_

 _But longed for still_

Maya Angelou

He was kissing her. Hermione felt like every cell in her body had been jolted into sudden life. She could think of nothing but his soft lips parting hers, his fingers gently pulling her hair, tilting her into him. His other arm curled around her body, pulling her closer as he deepened the kiss. Her stomach filled with butterflies as she was pressed against him, feeling the contours of his strong body. She knew this was the last thing, the very last thing she should be doing but without even meaning to, her hands wove into his hair, marveling at its softness. Her fingers traveled down over his shoulders, down to his chest. He gently bit her lip and she gasped into his mouth. She ached for his touch as his hand grabbed her hip, pulling her even closer to him. The world around them had disappeared, and they were standing on the edge of everything, just him and her. Nothing had felt more right, nothing less safe, nothing so captivating. Violently, she pushed herself away from him.

They stared at each other in shock, wide-eyed and breathless. Desire was smoldering in his grey stare as he looked down at her – desire and something else she couldn't place. As suddenly as he had kissed her, he turned and strode into his room, slamming the door behind him. Hermione was left standing there, completely stunned as her hand came up to touch her lips. It shouldn't have felt that way, she should have hated it. It shouldn't have felt so right. It was wrong. He was wrong. Slowly, fury filtered its way into her mind. How dare he kiss her? Was this some sort of sick joke of his?

"What the bloody fuck, Malfoy?!" The words flew out of her mouth, and angry yell, and she found herself storming up to his door. She discovered it locked and began to bang her hand on the wood. She needed an explanation. He had been leaving her with too many questions, and now this. Whipping out her wand she practically screamed 'alohomora' and the door almost flew off its hinges. She strode into the room her wand still drawn at her side. Malfoy was standing on the opposite side of the room, arms supporting him against the glass leading to his balcony.

"Malfoy." Her voice was menacingly low as she began to step towards him. He didn't move. He could have been paralyzed, standing there. Anger was whipping like a hurricane through her chest as she crossed the room. She froze a few feet away from him, a sliver of fear keeping her from getting too close.

"Turn. Around." She whispered, outrage dripping like venom from each word, but he still didn't move a muscle.

"You don't get to just stand there and ignore me. Turn around, Mal –"

Before she could finish her words, he had turned, closing the distance until there was barely any space separating them. Their eyes locked, and time disappeared. She felt as though he were staring into the very depths of her soul, his eyes almost glowing silver in the dim light, like pools of surging mercury. His breaths came out hard and shallow, and for a moment she thought he would kiss her again. For a moment she feared she would let him.

"Why?" She took a stumbling step away from him.

"Why what." His voice was low and gravely, and those seething, mournful, longing eyes were still fixated on hers.

"Everything. Why were you at the lake? Why did you – I don't know, rescue me? Why did you kiss me?" There were no words he could speak, and his eyes were flooding with emotion. He wanted to turn, to run from her. He wanted her to leave. He couldn't face this.

"Malfoy tell m—"

"I can't!" He yelled, closing his eyes. "I can't. I don't have an answer for you. Not now."

She slapped him. His eyes flew open, and he had never wanted to disappear more. She stood there, tears running like outlaws down her face, pain and confusion hidden just underneath the anger. He never wanted to be the person who caused that look on her face. But he was. He had been over and over.

"You don't get to treat me like the girls you bring back to you room. You will never touch me without my permission. Never again." Her voice was barely a whisper as she spoke, but it was there again in her eyes, that unconquerable fire. She turned and left the room.

xxxxx

Hermione woke with a start. She was freezing cold, feeling the ache of it deep in her bones. She sat up realizing she had fallen asleep on the floor. Her muscles were tired and weary, and her legs were gathered under her at an awkward angle. Her head felt clouded from lack of proper sleep. She had sunk to the floor by her door after leaving Malfoy's room the night before. For hours she had sat there just feeling it all, going over every second in her head again and again until she fell asleep like that. Suddenly, all the tiredness was gone. Malfoy had kissed her. She felt the sting of tears at her eyes.

"I hate you," she whispered. And she did, she did in that moment. She hated herself. Malfoy had felt like an electrical wire shocking her back to life. Every moment that had crashed them together, it had chipped away at the ice that had encased her since the war, since maybe even before then. It had invigorated her somehow. She didn't want to feel these things, didn't want to admit he had been a constant thought in the back of her mind. She felt furious, then. At herself, and at him. She hadn't even been worth an answer. He had brushed her off as if kissing her had just been the easiest way to shut her up. But it wasn't him she hated, no, it was her. She betrayed herself by feeling this way. Shakily she stood up, gently wiping away her tears. 'No' was not an answer she felt ready to accept. He needed to explain things to her. She deserved that much.

She felt a spike of hope course through her as she exited her room, and she cursed herself, her small, foolish self. What was she possibly hoping for? She didn't want to think about the way her heart seemed to leap at the thought of seeing him. She moved through the room too aware of every corner, every little shadow sitting silently across the floor. A knock at the portrait halted her in her tracks. She stared for a moment at his door before turning, frustrated, and yanking open the portrait hold. Dean raised his eyebrows at the scowl on her face.

"Bad time?" His deep voice asked her. She looked inward once more at his damn door, closed to her.

"No. It's fine. What's up?" Hermione pulled her gaze back to Dean's sweet and sexy half smile. She tried to let it erase everything she was feeling about – no, she wouldn't even think his name.

"There's something you're going to want to see," he said, holding out a hand to her, and it was so easy, so simple to reach out and take that hand and let him pull her out the door and away with him.

He led them down the familiar hallways, filling the corners with her laughter as they talked about everything they could think of. When they walked out the front doors of the castle, the cold of the winter felt far away next to him, and she liked the way that the white clouds of their breath seemed to collide around them.

"Dean, where on earth are you bringing me?" She asked when she saw they were standing at the edge of the Forbidden Forest.

"You'll just have to trust me, Mrs. Granger," he replied, and something about his bright eyes and intoxicating smile made her shake her head and laugh.

"By all means, lead on Mr. Thomas," she said, gesturing into the dimness of the forest stretching away before them.

As they walked between towering trees, Hermione felt as though she had stepped into a dream. The world glittered before them, kissed by ice and snow and no, the winter wasn't white, it was rainbow shards painted down on every branch. She lost herself in the freedom of wonder and the small sounds of walking with Dean. Several minutes passed before he stopped, turning and motioning for her to be silent, his finger hovering tantalizingly across his lips. She violently shoved away the memories of a different mouth pressed against hers. Dean took her hand and slowly, soundlessly, they crept to the center of a circle of tall beach trees that seemed to be smothered in ice.

Standing in the center of the trees, Dean turned to her once again with a smile on his face, and she felt her stomach tighten in excitement. He took one step away from her, and lifting his hands, he clapped them together. The sharp noise reverberated into the silence surrounding them and suddenly the air changed. Iridescent blue butterflies lifted like the chords of a song off the trees, surrounding the two of them as they escaped to the sky. Thousands of them filled the space between the trees and Hermione found herself slowly turning in wonder to watch them move, and then she was pressed against Dean, laughing while he watched her watch them.

When he leaned down to kiss her, it was a perfect moment, surrounded by butterflies, his lips so soft and gentle. He held her against him with a tenderness that made he feel warm against the cold. Nothing was wrong, and yet, yet, it didn't feel right. It didn't feel – like him. She pulled away and he let her, reaching up to tuck a curl behind her ear. She stared up at him, wanting so desperately to feel more than she knew she did. Dean was so good and probably exactly what she needed, and yet – how could she be satisfied kissing him when she knew that it could feel like Malfoy. She swallowed hard, more angry than ever that the prat had gone and messed with her head so much that she was about to say what she knew she was going to say to Dean – perfect, sweet, sexy Dean.

"I can't do this," and she wondered if she would regret that, "I'm so sorry. You are everything I should want to be with, and I can't understand why, but I just – I can't be more than friends with you." She saw the hurt in his eyes as he pulled away from her, but he smiled anyway, and somehow that felt worse.

"Hermione, it's okay. I can do just friends. But if you ever change your mind –" and he stopped, she didn't blame him.

"Lead you out to the forest and kiss you in a storm of butterflies?" She offered. Laughing, he nodded.

"You know what to do, Granger, if you ever want me." So they walked back to the castle, and the quiet between them was easy, comfortable, and in a bitter sweet way it reminded her of Harry.

xxxxx

She stood in front of his room, holding her breath, listening, but she couldn't hear a sound. Maybe he had already left. Hesitantly, she raised a small hand and knocked softly on the door. There was a moment of silence.

"Come in, Granger." His voice from behind the door sounded subdued and weary. She carefully entered the room, the doorknob cold against her fingers. Again, she was struck by the sheer plainness of Malfoy's bedroom. The white walls were almost aggressive, as if shouting desperately that not a single spec of dirt had assailed their surfaces. He was such a guarded person. Her eyes landed on the photograph she had given to him, hung on the wall across from his bed. The sight of it hanging there made her lungs decide to skip a breath. And then she saw him, sitting on the floor in front of the glass balcony doors. The cold winter light fell gracefully onto his hair, his broad shoulders hunched over as he wrapped himself loosely around his knees. She wondered if he had slept at all.

Something about him seemed more sincere than she had ever seen in him before. It was like the sarcastic and cruel tempered barriers had melted away, revealing the actual human being that hid behind them. She walked over and sat down beside him, for some reason no longer feeling nervous. Her eyes roamed across the sky outside - the clouds looked like a broken and empyrean desert of grey and white. They sat like that, each observing the world from their different angles, solitude settling into the room like a thick dust. Hermione finally spoke, her voice soft, falling gently into the silence.

"Tell me what's going on."

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw his head sink downward, his hands coming up to run themselves through his hair as if he had somehow been hoping she wouldn't ask him at all. Seeing him struggle so internally, she wanted to reach out to him, to comfort him. A part of her felt confused by it, but she also knew that it didn't matter that he was Malfoy - the boy who had spent all of his time teasing her and trying to put her down. She knew how it felt to suffer alone, trapped in your own twisted thoughts. She wouldn't wish that on anyone. She stayed quiet, though, stayed still where she sat cross-legged next to him. Regardless of what was haunting him, he had dragged her into it all and she needed answers. She needed to hear him say it.

"I didn't mean –" he stopped, his jaw clenching. "I didn't intend for this to happen. Any of it."

He looked back out the window, as if searching the sky for answers, then turned to the girl beside him, his eyes meeting her patient gaze. Something about her calmness eased him. His feelings were eating him alive.

"I have – " He swallowed hard. He had to tell her. He had no choice now. He watched as she searched his face, confused, maybe even worried. He swallowed again, refusing to look away from her.

"It's been longer than I care to admit that I've had these – feeling for you." His voice seemed like a shiver in the air. His eyes were so intent on hers, as if he were pleading her to understand. She could hardly breathe, unsure of how to accept his words. Her head felt dizzy at hearing them.

"And I was wrong." His whisper cut through the air like the softest curve of a feather. She felt herself blush under the heat of his gaze.

"Hermione, I was wrong and I'm sorry for it. I've spent a long damn time trying hard to make you hate me, to be someone that you could hate. I don't want to be. I never wanted to be. Or, I don't know. I intended to be for all the wrong reasons." Malfoy closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. If he was going to move forward, he had to lay it all out for her.

"During first year, I found myself so curious, interested in the girl who kept besting me in every class, and when I found out who you were, I hated myself for what I felt. I hated myself so much that I started hating you and nothing felt worse than that. I've struggled so long to feel nothing but disgust for you, but everything I learned about you made me like you all the more, for real reasons, ones I couldn't deny – your brilliance and kindness and strength and determination. But I – damnit, I've been such an idiot. I can't say anything to repair what I've done. I know that. But these damn feelings just won't go away, and being so close to you – it makes it so much worse."

Emotions began to run rampant through her – anger, confusion, wonder. She wanted to hate him for it all, the stupidity of it, for being such an uncontrollable ass to her. But she couldn't. Because at the back of his eyes she saw that glimpse once more, that glimpse of what it meant to be a Death Eater's son. She wondered if he had ever really believed in those things, or if he had simply been reciting all the poison his father had told him was the truth, drowning in it and unable to escape. His steel grey eyes bore into hers. She realized that if you actually paid attention, they spoke volumes. He was being torn apart, she could see it so clearly, and it wounded her. What the hell was she meant to do? She didn't know, and there was no book that could give her the answer.

He watched as she battled with her thoughts; they played out across her face like a novel, a horrible, heart wrenching novel, because he knew she would never feel the same pull that he did. A part of him wanted nothing more than to throw himself out the window. Fuck, he had been falling for her from the moment he had first heard her say the right answer and had been denying it ever since. She was his equal in every aspect – brilliant, cunning, driven. He had despised her for making him feel the way he did. He had done everything to kill those feelings, to ensure they would never become anything, that he would never be given the opportunity to betray everything he had been raised to stand for. He had been so cruel, so angry - so wrong. Looking at her now, he was overwhelmed by the desire to kiss her, to hold her, to protect her, to be loved by her, to turn it all around and somehow fix all the damage he had inflicted on them. He swallowed that down, knowing none of those things were tangible, and never would be. He was convinced of that. Slowly she stood up, carefully avoiding his eyes, afraid of what she would find there.

"I have to think. I can't think." Her voice was a whisper, every breath from her lungs so heavy with emotion that she could barely drag them out. She walked to the door, measuring each step, only too conscious of his eyes on her, like a sword slowly sinking into her chest.

Closing the door quietly behind her, she walked slowly and measuredly to the portrait hole, carefully stepping into the hallway. She had to get out of here. She needed to get away from it all. Her lungs burned as she sprinted down halls, past doors, up and down stairs. Without thinking, her feet began to carry her towards Gryffindor tower. She had to find Harry. She needed to hear his voice. He always knew what to say. She lurched to a stop, eyes wide, heart hammering. She felt herself sink to her knees, a wracking sob tearing through her body. He was gone. Harry was gone. She would never see him again. Never hear his voice again. He was gone.

She had never cried so hard, sitting there on the cold hard floor, barely holding herself together. Her mind felt consumed by sorrow, nothing was clear anymore. She clutched her arms around her stomach as if she could somehow keep herself from falling apart that way. Gone. Gone. He was gone. She wished she would drown in these tears. Reaching out, her hand scraping against the wall, she heaved herself to her feet. She ran blindly, trying to escape her thoughts, her fears, her very self. Somehow, her pounding feet carried her to the door. The door, plain and brown, calling out to her, a haven against the world. She pushed it open, throwing herself inside, gasping through her sobs. The bracing cold of the wind through the courtyard washed over her skin as she carried herself to the tree at its center. She collapsed against it, empty and torn apart. Tears fell from her eyes as she screamed again and again, calls so painful, so filled with torment and agony, that she hardly recognized her voice as human.

She felt someone's hand gently take hers.

"Hermione." His soft, caring voice spoke her name like it was a poem.


	7. Chapter 7

**Disclaimer: Oh well, I'm not JK Rowling.**

 **AN: Hey guys! So sorry for the delay in posting this chapter, I'm moving house and it has been a wee bit hectic with packing and the like. Either way, here it is! Thank you so much to all of you who have followed and commented on this story, it really means so much to see you guys like it. Enjoy chapter 7!**

Chapter 7

 _The heart_

 _Is forever inexperienced._

Henry David Thoreau

Gasping, Hermione's eyes flew open at the sound of his voice. Harry sat in front of her, looking at her with such love and sadness. She stumbled away, unable to breathe, unable to think. He disappeared as if he were made of smoke. Hermione stared at where he had been sitting, searching for any indication that he had actually been there, that she hadn't been hallucinating. The lingering warmth of where his hand had touched hers told her the truth. Her mind was reeling. She shuffled forward on her knees, taking deep, shuddering breaths.

She stopped as she neared the tree. Turning her face skyward, she stared at the gentle movements of the boughs, the blossoms seeming to almost shimmer like waves crashing on the shore. Looking forward again, she once again appraised the spot where Harry had been. How? How had he been there? Her mind seemed to be moving too quickly to understand. Tentatively, she reached out a hand, placing her palm against the smooth trunk. She held her breath, waiting, hoping.

Like dye expanding through water, Harry began to materialize in front of her, smiling his knowing smile. She blinked her eyes over and over, afraid he would disappear. She kept her hand pressed firmly against the tree, realizing that somehow it was allowing her to see her friend once more. Looking at him, there in front of her, she felt herself calm, her breathing slow, her body relax. She wanted to cry for joy, to jump and leap about, to embrace him – but she was afraid that if she moved at all, he would be forever lost to her once again.

Suddenly, it didn't matter what strains pulled at her from the outside world, she had this moment, no matter how fleeting, to once again see him and see him looking back. She knew it wasn't real, she knew this moment was a perfectly fabricated lie, but she didn't care. It felt so good to see him. His hair was as unruly as ever, and he smiled at her so calmly, as if he had been waiting for her to find him. His best friend.

They sat like that for a long time, simply staring at each other - one in disbelief, the other in patience. Slowly, Hermione raised her free hand, and Harry raised his. Their palms gently collided, resting against one another, and Hermione felt the warmth of his contact, as if the life within the ghost in front of her was somehow real, somehow more than just a memory. It seemed that nothing had ever felt so comforting or so painful.

"Hermione." She smiled at the sound of her name. "Hermione, why are you crying?" His voice was so kind and gentle, exactly like she remembered it. She savored every one of his words.

"I miss you. I miss you so much." Her voice broke as she struggled to keep her composure.

"Oh, Harry. Everything's gotten so complicated." She could hear the dejection in her own voice. He gave her a questioning look, imploring her to continue.

Like a bullet wound, she slowly began to pour out to him until her words soaked into the silence, pooling between them. Harry listened to all the things she had never said, the words she had kept to herself, his bright eyes sad and filled with love. She had been so lonely, so afraid to talk about how depressed she felt, about how differently she now saw the world. It was filled with both despair and possibility, as was she. She knew she was learning to love both the light and the shadow, but sometimes that darkness overwhelmed her. It felt like sorrow had invaded her skin and she could no longer separate it from herself. She had grown so accustomed to it that she didn't know if she could ever live without it at all.

She paused before she told him about Malfoy, looking down, unsure of herself. Eventually the words came to her, spilling out as if in a desperate attempt to bail out her sinking boat. Even if he did have real and actual feelings for her, even then, he had still chosen to treat her existence like it was an insult to the world. Even if he could change, even if he was changing, that part of him would always exist between them. How could she ever trust him? She bent her head, as if bowing to her careless heart.

"I so desperately want to be loved, Harry, to be in love." Her voice hitched. She didn't know if she were even capable of that anymore. She feared loss so much that she felt she could never truly attach to someone in that way again for terror that they too would disappear. Time had seemed to teach her to fear all things safe. When had her heart become so closed? What moment had forced her to decide within herself that loving someone was a risk not worth taking? She felt Harry wrap his fingers around hers, his skin so warm, hers so cold. It almost made her laugh, how contrary reality really was. Their eyes collided in that false space.

"You've always been the type to do what is right and fair for others. You've always treated people with such care and compassion, like they are things so precious, even if it meant sacrificing yourself. But Hermione, you are a person too, and you deserve the same love that you give to everyone around you. You deserve that from someone, but more importantly, your deserve that from yourself."

She had never wished that he wasn't dead more than at that moment, looking at his familiar face. He was only in her head, she knew that, but maybe that was still alright. He still lived on in her. As long as she remembered him, he would never truly die or slip away from her, not really. She swallowed the lump in her throat, nodding at him, trying not to cry. She knew that he was right, that she had been trying so hard to be okay for everyone else that she had ceased to be okay for herself.

"Harry," her breath faltered as she fought back a sob. "Harry, I don't know if I can do it. Love. Sometimes I feel like a monster; like I have become so twisted from fear and loss that I can't help but sever and have severed any connection to love that I have left. Sometimes – sometimes I just don't feel. As if I've switched my emotions off so many times that it's on autopilot and I can't stop it, can't control it anymore." Her eyes were dark lakes filled with fear.

Surprisingly, he smiled at her.

"No," he said. "The very fact that you want to love tells me that someday, you will. If you have to be numb to survive for now, then survive. Someday you will stop surviving, and begin to live. You love more fiercely than anyone I've ever known. That hasn't disappeared, I don't think it could."

She felt hot tears streak down her face, melting away perhaps just a bit more of that ice encasing her. She loved him. She missed him.

"Just – let yourself consider every possibility, okay Mione?" He looked pointedly at her. His words sounded so much like something she would have said to him. His hand tightened around hers, and then, like a dream, he disappeared into the wind that stirred the air. Hermione didn't know how long she sat there breathing, just breathing.

She knew what this tree was. She had read about it once, in a herbology text that Neville had recommended to her after the war. There had only been a short passage about it, a single paragraph about species of the Mnemosyne genus. They were extremely rare, and terribly difficult to grow, but they had the most soul aching gift of projecting a persons memories upon contact. When Hermione left that room, she knew that she would never go back.

xxxxx

Darkness had descended like a thick cloak by the time she got back to the Head Dormitory. Her body was so cold she could barely move her hands. She had spent a long time in the courtyard thinking about herself and how to move forward. And she had to move forward. Time stopped for no one. Slowly, piece by piece, she was beginning to open herself to the world, like a flower afraid to bloom. But she had to trust herself and give herself the time that she needed to grow. Malfoy had his feelings for her, whatever that really meant, and she wouldn't lie to herself, she obviously felt some sort of something for him. But Harry had been right – she needed to care for herself first. She couldn't look past all the animosity that had happened between them; there weren't enough good memories to make up for all the awful ones he'd left her with. But she was coming to realize more and more how little she knew of what was behind those silver eyes and some part of her wanted to know more.

She sighed, rubbing her tired eyes as she walked through the portrait hole. She could not fathom why, of all people, she was so attracted to the one boy who had tried to make her life miserable for years. She was attracted to him; she would be stupid to keep denying it. But it was all so complicated - she was so complicated. She felt like important pieces of her had been tainted and damaged by the war, pieces like trust and happiness and meaningfulness. Maybe that was what attracted her to Malfoy; he understood what it meant to be messed up better than anyone.

She really, desperately needed a cup of tea. Slowly, the warmth of the fire emanating through the room reached her, bringing movement back to her hands as she prepared the pot and set out a mug with loose leaf black tea from a muggle shop back home. It was her favorite shop in the world - C'est La Tea. The water had just started to boil when she heard the door to Malfoy's room open. He walked out, looking sleepily at her. It seemed that one of them, at least, had managed to catch up on rest. Hermione had spent the entire afternoon underneath the tree, watching the movement of light through its blossoms.

"Tea?" She asked, glancing at him. He nodded, sitting down on one of the chairs of the round dining table. She pulled out another mug from one of the cabinets, placing a teabag inside. Steam reared up, nuzzling her face, as she poured the water. She turned, leaning back against the counter and stretched out her hand to offer Malfoy one of the mugs. His fingertips briefly brushed her hand as he took it from her, and the small contact sent shivers through her skin. But the mug slipped from his fingers and Hermione jumped as scalding hot water hit her legs, ceramic shards exploding across the floor.

"What –" Hermione's words abruptly cut off at the look on his face. He looked haunted, and something about it made her want to cry. His eyes were fixed, unmoving on her arm. She didn't have to guess what he was looking at, she knew. The bright white scar stood out starkly against her pale skin – 'mudblood'. The very word he had used so many times to degrade her. The very word his own aunt had carved into her arm.

The silence in the room was consuming. He looked up at her. Slowly, carefully, Hermione withdrew her hand to her side. She didn't know what to feel at the shame written like letters across his face. He had been there. He had made the choice to stand by and let it happen. Suddenly, she felt angry at him, so furious for his inaction. But she wasn't so stupid or selfish to believe that he could have done anything. They would have killed him if he had. But still, a part of her would like to believe she would have stopped it had the roles been reversed, even if it cost had her her life. She wanted to believe she would. But maybe she wouldn't have, and suddenly the realization that they had lived such terribly different lives made him feel miles away from her.

A moment stretched between them like a small infinity. Conflicting emotions fought brutally within her. She was barely breathing, he could barely stop. Carefully, Malfoy stood up. She had forgotten how tall he was when he was this close. He took a step towards her and she felt her heart speed up. He must be able to hear it. How could he not? He was so close to her and it was beating so loud. She could have reached out her fingers to brush his skin. Could have leaned in and pressed herself against him. She could smell him, and it was so intoxicating, the heat of it. Slowly, so slowly, he knelt down, never taking his eyes off hers. The force of the moment threatened to knock her apart. Could she believe his words to her? God, she wanted to. She realized then just how much she wanted to. Damn her blasphemous heart. He sunk to his knees before her, as if in worship, and began to pick up the pieces of the broken mug. He stood again, and carefully moved past her, placing the broken shards on the counter. She felt electricity under her skin where he had brushed her arm. There was soft clinking as he reassembled the mug into a whole piece. Maybe they had a chance for that, too.

"Hermione." His voice sounded so close behind her. Every inch of her wanted to run, but she forced herself to stay. No more running. She had to face him, but her thoughts swirled like starlings.

"How can I believe you?" Why did her voice sound so small?

"You'll just have to trust me." She didn't need to see his face to feel his anxiety, hope, confusion, desperation. It was all there in those few words.

"I don't know if I can." Another silence fell upon them like a siege. She closed her eyes for the briefest of moments, taking a slow, quiet breath. In the darkness of her mind, amid the chaos of thought and feeling, she knew that somehow she had come to feel – something for him. She wondered how, and as if she had let a drop fall into an unknown pool, a thousand more questions were stirred by the ripples of it. But she had made her choice. She chose herself.

"But that doesn't matter, not right now. I need to love myself first before I can think about loving someone else. So lets start somewhere else. Not as – whatever this is." She heard him take a breath behind her, and she wasn't sure what it meant.

"As friends," she heard him say, exactly like she had needed him to, and it still didn't sting any less. There was so much underneath those words, and all she could do was nod her head. Betraying herself, she walked away, fleeing to the safety of her room, unable to face him any longer. He was left standing alone, his heart hammering, her cup of tea forgotten on the counter. He stood there until the steam disappeared and the warmth fled the water. They were starting somewhere.

xxxxx

A hand waved in front of Hermione's face, snapping her back to reality. Parvati sat across from her in the library, her eyebrows raised and a suspicious look on her face. The other Gryffindor had invited Hermione to do homework together, and not wanting to be in her own dorm room, Hermione had agreed. Two days had gone by since Malfoy and her had agreed to be friends, and she hadn't seen him in the dorm once. She felt secretly grateful for it – she didn't know how to be his friend.

"I know that look." Parvati was waving her quill at Hermione's face. "You're thinking about a boy!"

"I'm not," Hermione answered too quickly. "I'm not." The expression on Parvati's face told her she didn't believe it for a second. Raising one eyebrow, they both went back to their reading and a few minutes passed in silence.

"So who is it?" Hermione glanced up to see Parvati's maniacal smile. "Is it Dean? I totally wouldn't blame you. Is it?"

Hermione couldn't help but laugh at the girl's brazenness.

"No, it isn't Dean. Although we did kiss, but I told him I only want to be friends. And I do. There's no boy." She swallowed and looked away, knowing she was lying through her teeth and feeling terrible for it.

"Okay, we will circle back around to the Dean thing, but Hermione, you are the worst liar I've ever seen." She leaned across the table, her eyes filled with intrigue.

"Is it someone bad?" Hermione felt herself blush.

"Oh my god, it is someone bad!" Parvati whispered with all the secrecy of an elephant parade.

"Shh, shhh!" Hermione leaned closer to the girl across the table.

"Listen, it's all very complicated. Am I attracted to him? Yes. Damnit. Yes, I really am. But nothing is going to come of it. I couldn't – it would never work. I don't know if we can even be friends." She felt her heart drop as she admitted it. Could they really be friends after all that had happened? She sighed, looking at the excitement written all across Parvati's face.

"Please let's keep this between us." The idea of grey eyes filled with sadness and betrayal and anger overtook her thoughts. Malfoy would be so hurt if she went around telling people about what had transpired between the two of them, she knew he would be even though he would try to hide it like it were a horcrux. She didn't want to be another source of pain for him. And maybe a part of her wanted to prove that she was deserving of his care, wanted to protect him.

"You haven't said a name."

"I'm not going to."

"It's not a proper secret if you don't tell who."

"Oh?" Hermione said, trying to flip the page of her book as nonchalantly as she could.

"Tell me."

"I don't think I should."

"Why not? I have a pretty good guess already." Hermione swallowed hard, feeling a blush come over her features. She wanted to pick the book up and hide behind the damn thing, but that would have been just too obvious.

"Oh interesting, did you know that aconite can be used as an additive in memory potions to stimulate higher levels of neuronal firing?" She tried to keep her tone casual.

"It's Malfoy isn't it?"

"Oh my god, you are relentless."

"It is, isn't it?"

"Parvati, I don't want to say."

"So it is."

Hermione glared at the girl as hard as she could.

"Don't worry, I won't tell anyone. You can trust me." And something about the look in Parvati's eyes made Hermione feel like she really could. Something about that look wanted to know more, too.

"Can we drop it? Please?" Parvati smiled sweetly at Hermione.

"Yes we can. But you have to tell me if something ever happens. I'm not going to judge you, Hermione. We can't control what the heart wants. But be careful with yourself." Parvati reached across the table and squeezed Hermione's hand. She realized that she wasn't the only one trying to repair the holes in her life. Parvati had lost her best friend, too. She remembered seeing Lavender's motionless body on the ground, Fenrir Greyback hunched over her, his teeth tearing at the flesh of her throat. Humans were so fragile. Hermione smiled at the girl, nodding, feeling suddenly closer to her, feeling happy and sad and hopeful. Humans were fragile in so many, many ways.


End file.
